


Stepping Stones

by love2imagine



Series: Out of this World [8]
Category: White Collar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-24
Updated: 2014-06-24
Packaged: 2018-02-06 01:09:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1838869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/love2imagine/pseuds/love2imagine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Immediately after Out in the Open...Neal goes 'home'. And as the title says, it is a stepping stone to the next in the series, Out in the Sunshine</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stepping Stones

 

 

 

Neal jumped.

 

His heart was racing as though all the demons of hell were chasing him, he was struggling with tears. He arrived with something of a bump (though he might have imagined that) in his bedroom at Steel Keep. He sank down on the bed, feeling huge relief, embarrassment and sadness in about equal measures.

 

He knew they wouldn’t follow. But – but they’d been at the door, it had been almost closed…he hadn’t given a thought to locking it! His brain shuffled through the deck of dangers and possibilities…but everything of real value there was behind the strong and protected panels Mozzie had joyfully installed as soon as the FBI were no longer entitled to just waltz in and search. They were totally hidden and locked with Steel’s mechanisms, keyed to Mozzie’s, June’s and his vibration. His spare sword and dagger, throwing knives, a revolver and a pistol, money, gold…and other things Peter shouldn’t know about.

 

Peter…and El…

 

Well, it was all out in the open and over, finished. Years of his life tangled up with two people who wanted him to be someone he wasn’t, who didn’t seem to care **_enough_** …well, finally, he’d done what he should have years ago. He should have cut and run when Peter had told him ‘cowboy up’ the first time. If he’d been smart enough, he would have understood the lack of compassion then. Kate would have found him, or she wouldn’t. He wouldn’t have wasted **_years!_**

 

About two minutes later, while he was still sitting there getting himself calmed down, there was a soft knock on the door and when, in surprise, he called “Come in!” it opened and Tamlin stuck her head in.

 

“Neal!” she said. “I heard you…are you all right?”

 

Neal grinned, shaking off his gloom. He shouldn’t have bounced in, radiating. He knew there were sensitives here.

 

He stood up and said, “I am actually okay, Tamlin, but I just came from a break-up.”

 

“Peter?” she said. She entered the room, and carried on pulling her clothing straight and smoothing her rumpled hair.

 

“How could you know **_that?_** ” he demanded. He suddenly realised that he didn’t have his ear-bug, he’d just jumped without any thought, in his pyjamas and robe! How fortunate that he and Mozzie had learnt Sheel!

 

“Oh, I saw what was happening when you were all here! Want a hug?”

 

“Tamlin, I would love a hug!”

 

She ran the few steps and they embraced each other. She cuddled up to him and said, “You are probably better off. He does not understand you very well.”

 

“No, it seems that way.” Neal’s eyes filled with tears for his loss, and this charming girl who loved him.

 

“Not that it is ever easy, is it?”

 

“No. My silly heart remembers what it thinks happened, not what did happen. My mind keeps having to present evidence, over and over. But tonight…is it night, here?” he glanced at the window, which showed only darkness, “well, tonight, I presented the evidence to Peter and Elizabeth both. And I left them there and ran home!”

 

“Good thing to do!” Tamlin said, looking up at him and running her fingers through his still slightly damp hair. “People here love you!”

 

“I know. I thought not of coming here…it was pure instinct.

          “They seem not to realise…”

 

“They knew not what they had till they lost it.” Tamlin said, and Neal’s mind wandered after a song lyric. “They had their chance and they ruined it. Their loss!”

 

“Oh, Tammy, I wish…I hate losing people!”

 

“I know, sweet Neal. However, if we did not, we would have too many friends.”

 

“Too many?”

 

“Yes! I cannot be a true friend to more than a few people, especially if I have a love in my life, too,”

 

“I suppose you are right. There is something wrong there…we can never have more than one lover, either. I know people say it is possible, but it is not. It is always cheating on one or the other...”

He sighed, and hugged her tighter, so pleased to have her and her warmth there.

 

“Can I tell Diana?” asked Tamlin. “I will not if you say.”

 

“Oh, is Di here? How lovely! I will see her tomorrow! I will not keep you from her, though, there is never enough time with a lover!”

 

“No, that is true. But when I said you needed me, she almost pushed me out of bed to come here!”

 

“And I have to congratulate you, Tamlin! You are to be a mother! How exciting! I told Diana the child would be loved, but I did not tell her another truth: this child will also be very good-looking!”

 

“She said you guessed it!”

 

“It almost seemed that way.”

 

“I will - ”

 

There was another tap on the door. Neal looked at Tamlin. “Diana?”

 

Tamlin grinned at him and shook her head. Neal called “Come in!” and Steel opened the door.

 

“My Lord!” Neal said, and dropped his head in respect.

 

Tammy hugged Neal and said, “I am sorry, but I believe it is good for you, and we are glad you are here!” and she kissed his cheek and left him, touching Steel’s arm as she passed him.

 

“Give Diana my love, I shall see her tomorrow!” Neal said to her.

 

Steel closed the door after a Tamlin. “My Lord,” Neal said, smiling. “I am pleased to see you. Did Tamlin call you?”

 

“No, dear Neal, you called quite loudly enough for me to hear! We are bonded, it is clearer than previously.”

 

Neal stood, letting the Lord make the first move and Steel strode across and took his hands. At that Neal stood up straighter and looked into his Lord’s eyes and explained in a few words. “…I hated doing it,” he finished, miserably.

 

“My dear son, everything you said was true, was it not?” Steel asked.

 

“Yes, my Lord,” Neal said. “True as I see it, which is what they wanted me to explain.”

 

“You are sad.”

 

“Yes. I wish now I had lied. I wish my lies were the truth! Why are things always so complicated?”

 

Steel shrugged. “I asked Lira that once. She said everything seems twisted around and awkward – her words were more poetic – because the only things that truly matter to most of us are relationships. If we are talking about a relationship with another person, it is always difficult because all the people are damaged. So all the cracks and rough edges and weak spots in all of us cut into each other or catch on each other. If we were all healed, whole, perfect, then our interactions would be smooth and comfortable.”

 

Neal gazed at him, thinking. “So that is why it is often easier to have a satisfying relationship with an animal.”

 

Steel smiled. “Yes. How much easier to go and talk to my dogs, or one of the horses! They love simply and usually have less cracks and rough places, unless they are truly vicious. Interesting, Neal.”

 

“So, my Lord, how can we heal each other? Because if that is always true, making the world – any planet! – a nicer place would just involve healing all the people…”

          Neal smiled up at his Lord, suddenly sunny and full of hope. “That is what you do, my Lord! You said you try and help people and – and make people happy, give them the chance to be who they really want to be. That is why your Keep is so pleasant to live in, why we all felt surprisingly at home here, on alien soil. We all made friends, and some of those relationships are going to be life-long.

          “Too much of the western Earthling society where we live is designed so that people become damaged. It is very competitive. Parents force their children into sports or activities, even schooling and education is competitive. Everyone feels stressed. There is a great deal of fear…I should say **_was!_** The alien wars, without that intent, rubbed away old systems, most of which had become corrupt at least in part. I wonder if it will be better now, as the children grow up, or if their previously damaged parents will hurt them.”

 

“A planet-wide experiment,” Steel agreed. “We should hope and pray that things become happier for all the Earthlings.”

 

“So far they seem to be. Children seem to laugh and play more. June and I sometimes go to the park, now, and the small children are running around laughing. I remember some of that when I was small.”

 

“You used to run and laugh, Neal?”

 

Neal hesitated. “No-ooo. Perhaps when I was very small.”

 

“What was it like at school?”

 

“I started – missing – school when I was about eight.”

 

“Ah, you started on your career early. So your light-heartedness, much of it must be an act.”

 

Neal cocked his head on one side and nodded and shrugged.

 

“It all worked for good in the end, Neal.”

 

“How did you conclude that, my Lord?”

 

“Give me a hug!” Lord Steel ordered, feeling glad that he had made himself just ask for Neal’s affection. Neal immediately and enthusiastically obeyed and they stood a moment in each other’s warmth before Steel put his chin on Neal’s head, getting tickled by the curls.

          He had another strong visceral reaction, remembering leaning close to an exhausted, filthy piece of human merchandise who was desperately holding onto a valiant facade, feeling his curls tickle his chin while the strange man had told him to take his two friends…one of whom was Peter…and leave him to the Slaver’s cruelty, to ensure that Steel would be able to buy those two.

          Steel breathed deeply, again amazed at how close they had been to missing each other in time and space. He said a brief, silent prayer of thanksgiving, stood away from Neal and went on,

“If you had not taken to the life of crime – if you had not been a successful planet-wide criminal and partnered with a brilliant mentor and friend – then the FBI would not have become involved, as I understand it.

          “A young, extremely intelligent, determined, obsessive New York agent would not have found you an irresistible target and worked hard for years and years to catch you and imprison you.

          “And he would not have been called in when you broke out to find your lost love. And you would not have had the chance to entice him with your knowledge of – um – Candian bank-note threads? Have I that correctly? – and lure him into putting you on a slave-anklet-thing and getting you to help him catch the …Dutchman?

          “And because you were so successful, you ended up being a permanent fixture at White Collar. And you would not have been there when the alien war-force arrived and then been taken by the slave-ship, and you would not have ended up at the slave market with Peter and June when I went shopping…and I would not have ended up with a very special pair of sons.”

 

Neal pulled away, his eyes huge. “How on earth …um, _silly!_ How do you **_know_** all of that?”

 

“You gave me the basics, when I asked how the three of you had become friends. And then Mozzie, as your lawyer, demanded all the documents the FBI had on you, remember? When I heard of that he had them, I, as your father, I demanded them, too.”

 

“Oh!”

 

“Mozzie said since the FBI had been able to access them for years, you would mind not if I saw them…we sat and read and laughed at all the crimes you were supposed to have committed, often in different parts of the planet at the same time! He explained it all to me, and we wrote out a short and true summary. I think you would be amused to read them with us. Sometimes an agent has suggested that you were involved with a violent crime, and always Peter wrote that he believed that you would never do such a thing.

          “You should read it, Neal. There is a mountain of evidence and clues and theories, but almost none tie back to you. You truly are a genius.”

 

“I realised not that Mozzie visited here this often, Lord!”

 

Steel smiled at him. “I am so grateful for the affection we share, Neal. As he said himself, Mozzie finds intimate closeness less comfortable. However, he and I are good friends and we laugh a great deal together and he has helped tremendously with some of our problems. He even brought Klenalth a saddle to see if we would prefer to change the design of ours!

          “I would have placed gold on the fact that Mozzie knew not enough of saddles to realise that ours were different!”

 

“Both of us, Lord!” Neal smiled at him. “I am glad one of your sons makes you laugh! I seem to always be here in a dark, dangerous and dismal mood!”

 

“You care. Mozzie protects himself. Obviously you will be hurt more often. But I have asked him to join us, Neal, if that is well with you. I think we need to have a happy time going through the boxes, and boxes and boxes of false evidence the FBI clung to all those years and probably confused themselves utterly!”

 

Neal gave him a quick hug and laughed. “Let us do that, my Lord! No wonder Mozzie always thought I was being an idiot wanting Peter to trust and – and love me. I was! How could a Fed and a conman - not a criminal! - ever really get along?”

 

“It is never bad to love, Neal, but it can be a dangerous pastime.

          “It looks as though you are ready to sleep! I think, since Diana is here, she can come and laugh with us tomorrow!”

 

“I am coming to sleep with your dogs, my Lord. There is no fire in here, no one expected me, and even if I make it now the room will take a long while to warm!”

 

“I think the quite huge bed in my room…I never could understand why it was so much bigger than beds for broad, muscular workmen! …will hold both of us with great ease! I am not sure the dogs will share….Sooner or later, Neal, you will have to give them more meat!”

 

“You never have to come searching for me any more, my Lord!”

 

They laughed and left together. But though Neal could hide his hurt as any conman worth his ticket could, he'd just have to wait for his heart to heal.

 

 

 

 

 

The End

 

 


End file.
